Bears Ears and the "local" card

An old piece that I'm republishing since it's always apt

One of the first “literary” things I ever wrote was a poem that began, “The Bears Ears, have you ever seen them?” It was hardly profound, had neither meter nor rhyme, and was only about five lines long. But then, I was only about seven years old, and I wrote it in one fell swoop while sitting by the side of the road to Hovenweep National Monument in sou…